Need for prayer

Please take some time to read about our church plant. We would greatly appreciate your prayers.

June support letter

Please feel free to pass this along to anyone who might be interested.

Time to put life into perspective.

It was Chloe's birthday today. She turned 6. She asked for a special birthday meal. She asked for rice and geem (dried sea weed).

So, we took our pictures for our support card. I bought the Canada t-shirts and we took a family portrait. I took some random shots with our daughters.















OK, now it's been almost 5 years since we landed here in California. Look how much they have changed!

Oh hum... time to take it all in and accept that my girls are growing up.

Lord, help me.

Leaving for the North Country

I'm leaving for Edmonton again. I'll be travelling alone this time.

I would really appreciate your prayers. There is so much to do to get this church plant going - prayer support, fundraising, vision casting, organizing the church ministry and structure.

Please pray for:

1. safety for my girls at home
2. gospel transformation in the preaching
3. safe travels
4. relationship building

Thanks everyone!

Walking a mile in another woman's shoes.

So, for the 8+ years that Su Jin and I have been married she has been so supportive of my ministry. I hadn't realized it until now. I have been taking her for granted in so many ways. Ok, for the past few weeks since my resignation I have been trying to take care of the house, the girls, and dinner. For all you mothers out there reading this I acknowledge that what you do is TOUGH! Su Jin, I APPRECIATE YOU SO MUCH!!

I will experience yet another aspect of what it means to support a minister of the gospel. The shoe is on the proverbial other foot today. We will be heading down to San Diego so that Su Jin could speak for a women's seminar. I'll be watching our kids while Su Jin is speaking. I'll be waiting around while Su Jin is meeting and talking with people. Su Jin has been doing this ever since Phoebe was born. When we go to church, Su Jin always had her attention on our kids. When one of the acted up she was the one to address them and correct them. If you are a husband/father reading this, let me encourage you to not leave this responsibility up to your wife. Hope I can be a good supportive hubby.

On a different technical note, I've turned on our RSS feed for this blog. I recently found out that I don't have to save all the blogs I read onto my bookmarks and go to each page manually. I can just subscribe to the RSS feed and click on favorites to see who has updated. For those of you who are using the RSS thank you!

New and improved...

So here's a picture of me with my new and improved hair cut. Actually this was me at the beginning of April. Now, it looks a little over grown. I'll go in for a little trim tomorrow. I was the only one in our family that liked my shaved head. Chloe cried (literally)! Phoebe was polite but it was obvious that she did not like it. Su Jin was... um displeased. Oh, well just a couple of more weeks and I'm sure it will be back to its full form.

I secretly wish I could shave it all off again!

On a different note: It seems like random Philly people come back into my life. Guess who came for a visit? Woosik Lim, aka: Woo Tang Clan (I think that had something to do with his email back in the day). He was one of the college students when I was a jundo in PHL. He's visiting some friends in LA and then off to a bachelor party in Las Vegas. So apparently Jason Paik is finally tying the knot. We had a nice chat reminiscing over carne asada burritos. Mmmm...

Church Plant
I'll be travelling again May 4 to preach in Edmonton. I also plan to go back again May 18th. They are planning a retreat for that weekend. I am planning to stop in PHL to visit my parents on May 21st and then off to NY for our denominations General Assembly. I would really appreciate all your prayers!

Our house situation
Lord, help us with this decision. As you may know, the housing boom in Southern California has finally plateaued (some were expecting the bubble to pop). It's a difficult situation for us b/c we have only been in the house for 17 months. What you may not know is that Edmonton has just started their housing boom. OK, then to summarize our current housing situation: buyer's market in So. Cal and seller's market in Edmonton. We're considering refinancing. Pray for us to make a wise decision.

Edmonton Visit

Edmonton Visit

May The Force Be With You

Last Thursday (before our Canada trip) I took the girls out to see the Star Wars Exhibit. It was a great exhibit for me, personally speaking. Chloe said, "I was a little disappointed." Seriously, that's what she said after we walked through the exhibit. I think she said that b/c the entire exhibit was on the third floor and was probably half the size of the other exhibits in the Science Center. I wished I could have spent more time walking through the exhibit and take a closer look at the costumes and models. The girls were expecting something like a Star Wars theme park where actors were dressed up as Jedis and stormtroopers.

Su Jin had to work so she was bummed out that she couldn't go.

Here are the pics from that day.

Star Wars Exhibit

May the Force (of God) Be With You!

See you on the other side?

We made it to Edmonton, Su Jin too! Thanks for all your prayers.

Due to some complications Su Jin could not fly with us. Our flights were on 2 different airlines but leaving at the same time. Su Jin was connecting in Calgary and arriving earlier. The girls and I were changing planes in Denver.

I was calling Su Jin after checking in to see if she was allowed to board. They gave her her tickets and we would just have to wait as she arrived in Calgary. Would the green card be enough? As we were boarding we called one last time and said that we would hopefully see each other in Edmonton.

On the lay over in Denver I left a message with Su Jin to see if she cleared customs. Our layover was about 2 hours. She called right before our boarding and everything was fine.

We landed and we cleared customs without any problem. We cleard the doors and there she was waiting for us.

Thank you Lord, for making this trip possible.

Happy Easter everyone!

Leaving for Edmonton

Despite not getting Su Jin's passport renewed our family will be travelling to Edmonton tomorrow. We found out that Su Jin's green card will be enough to allow her in and out of the U.S. Please pray that she is allowed to fly and clears customs!

Looking back...

CPC Memories

This will be our first Sunday away from CPC-EM. It's sad but it helped me to remember all the memories that I have of everyone. I was recently reorganizing my pictures on my home computer and came across a bunch of pics from the past. Lots of things have changed over 4 1/2 years. Click on the link above to take a stroll down memory lane with me.

If you have any pictures or videos of me send me a link or email me. And yes, I have seen the video of me dunking and falling off the rim. I don't think our college guys will ever let me live that memory down.

Cliche I know but... thanks for the memories! Our prayers will be with you tomorrow CPC.

New office space

So this is a picture of my new office space. As some of you know I resigned from my position at Cerritos Presbyterian Church (CPC). The office was pretty nice - spacious, had all my books right there, a nice big desk, and pretty comfortable. Now, I have a computer in a cabinet in my living room. It's not bad at all. In fact, it feels pretty good.

I'm beginning the preparations for the church plant. You should see some information and postings on the Hallelujah Christian Fellowship blog some time soon. I would greatly appreciate all your prayers.

Oh, you're probably wondering what that fuzzy thing is in the foreground of the picture. It's my head. Yeah, I've been having this weird/eccentric desire to shave my head. I was considering going all the way down to the skin but Su Jin wouldn't have it. I actually misinterpreted what she was thinking cause she didn't even want me to shave my head at all. Whoops. So, on tuesday I went to the barber and asked him to give me a "high and tight" - military jargon for a good ol' buzz. I'm glad that I did it. It is quite a refreshing feeling but you can feel the slightest breeze. I actually had trouble sleeping the first night cause it was a little chilly that night. There is something strange about your body being toasty under the covers while you're head is feeling slightly cool. I'll post a full pic later. Just want to present more mystery for the time being.

Spring is a good time to plant.

Our presbytery finished meeting last night. I was approved to be a church planter in Edmonton, Alberta CANADA.

Two more weeks and I am finished here at Cerritos Presbtyerian Church - English Ministry. I really can't believe it. What a great experience I had here!

Please keep us in prayer. If you would like more details about the church plant, I'll be working on it real soon. Let me know if you would like to pray and/or support us.

Here's a new blog where you can go for updates on the church plant. HallelujahChristianFellowshipBlog (click on link)

Eeek!

We are OK! This past Saturday, I was taking my girls to gymnastics class. On the way we got into an accident (as you can see). I was travelling in the right lane and the left lane was backed up. A guy in a truck, travelling in the opposite direction was making a left turn across traffic. Apparently a car in the left lane created space for him to cross. He crossed right in front of me and tried to beat me. There was not much time to react and all I remember is my tires screeching and hitting the back of the truck. It was a little frightening and our girls were crying. But, we walked away with scratches from our seat belts.

The thing that gets me is that the other driver is an immigrant. Nothing wrong with immigrants, I was one at one point. I say this because he did not have a drivers license nor any insurance. His vehicle was impounded because of those reasons. The immigrant population is extremely high here in CA and for obvious and natural reasons. The debate on immigration policies is hotly debated but I am now more convicted that immigration should be more strictly enforced.

As a matter of perspective, I am thankful that we are all safe. This kind of throws a wrench into our life but this too works out. As we transition from our church ministry and prepare our move to Canada we were planning to sell our car anyways. Now, we will just get insurance money for it. I found out yesterday that the car will not be able to be repaired.

Where are you?

Just wanted to see what kind of hits we're getting on our family site.

SOME ANTICIPATED HITS

Family locations:
Edmonton
Seattle
Ottawa, Ontario
Philadelphia (but parents can't surf the web).

Friends:
Cerritos, CA
Philadelphia, PA
Cherokee, NC
Boston, MA
NYC, NY

Thank you for all your prayers!

I want to thank all of you who were in prayer for the announcement of my resignation at CPC. It went relatively well - mostly shock and sadness. The transition time was and is being handled well by our leaders. They are moving quickly to fill the position. Please continue to lift up this ministry.

For the rest of you who are just hearing for the first time, I announced my resignation this past Sunday. I have been here for four and a half years. I can't believe it has gone by so quickly. There has been so many memories here. The support and encouragement that I have received has been overwhelming. Many have expressed just in the matter of days their sadness to see me go. I simply reply that I am sad too. Please continue to pray that I would complete this ministry well.

New prayer request:
I shared with the the EM here that I have accepted an invitation to plant a church with a small group in Edmonton, Alberta CANADA. That's right, you heard correctly. We're going back to Su Jin's home town. I'll be sharing more about this opportunity with you all in the future. My last Sunday will be March 25th. Su Jin has to complete her contract to teach until the end of June. Starting in April I will be taking some time to pray and prepare for this effort. Please pray for me. I would greatly appreciate it. I hope to share with many of you the vision and plan.

Memorial of Pastor Al Groves

I thought I was challenged by Prof Groves and his families testimony as they anticipated his passing.

I found out today that he wrote a personal letter to be read at his own memorial service.

I was challenged and blessed to read his letter. It made me think of Psalm 112. Click on Prof Groves picture if you want to read the letter.

Ok, now that's FAITH!

Friends of Al Groves

Click here if you want to be stretched in faith.

CJ's first tooth

OK, it's Chloe's turn to start loosing her teeth. I think she's losing them faster than Pb b/c as soon as this tooth was loose she was wiggling that tooth every chance she had. She lost it today after school when she was jumping rope. Her day care teacher put it in a nice little container. But, as soon as we got home she was playing with it and it rolled into the cushions of one of our chairs. The problem is that it's the kind of chair that doesn't have removeable cushions. I tried as hard as I could to find it. CJ tried to be as brave as she could but it was too much to bear. She started balling! I tried to look for it some more but it was in the chair for good. She was looking forward to putting it under her pillow.

I'll still put the quarter under her pillow tonight... or was it a dollar?

Reunion - Pastoral Style

The English Ministry Pastor's Conference was held at Sarang Community Church this past week. Since it was so close I decided to go. I was blessed and challenged by the speakers.

It was also a time to catch up and reminisce about the past. Here's a list of the peeps I ran into:

Pastor Daniel Kim - former senior pastor of KUC and now sr. pastor of Sarang.
OK, everyone is a pastor so I'll leave that out. You have to call Pastor Daniel pastor cause I just respect the guy. But, that doesn't mean I don't respect the following people.

Joe Myung - used to be in Houston but now in San Diego
Paul "Hooch" Lee - formerly at KUC but in the Phila area
Paul Kim - still at Emmanuel (he still looks young but he's going grey... weird), and Man, can he preach!
Min Chung - still in Urbana (wow, he's changed... much more calm and wise; I was blessed by him)
Hyung Kim - older brother that graduated WTS before me, served at Emmanuel and now somewhere in Cleveland
Young Choi - served in IV at Swarthmore, then studied at U of Wisconsin, and now in Atlanta
Duk Jin - younger brother that graduated after me and is currently serving at Sarang
Pastor Steve Park - another man I respect quite a bit
Fuji - what a dear brother
Michael Oh - what is he doing at an EM conference?!
Rick Kim - I met up with him right after we moved to CA.
Iron Kim - We met up after he moved down from San Fran but been to busy to meet up with him.
Bruce Lim - Now, that's an oldy from the past... served at KUC with his wife Susan. I think they were in NY. He moved to CA a year ago and I had no idea that he was here.

I met some new faces. Still meeting some other pastors in the CA area. It's weird but pastors have to network too.

If you're reading this try to take out some time to pray for your pastors regularly.

thanks for your prayers!

WOW...37!

37 is OLD! I turned one year older today. I'm thankful for my health, my family, and my ministry. I told Su Jin today that I don't look forward to my birthdays anymore. Not b/c I'm sad for aging but b/c the festivities; the cake, the presents don't mean much to me.

I am reminded that I am loved by my family. This picture means way more to me than the cake or the recognition that I get on this day. I am encouraged by my wife who is so supportive.

Thank you everyone!